persons beside his Honor the Pope, lay Claim to Infallibility, upon due Consideration it seemeth not, that I am guilty of such high Crime and Misdeameanour, as by any Rule in Law to be subjected to Indictment or ex officio Information. However, I think it incumbent on you to suffer your Readers to be advertiz'd, that instead of immediately in his Honor's Reply to the House of Representatives, as published in your Paper of the 6th of August, they ought to read mediately; which may prevent some other Chatterer from rudely attempting to convince the World that he is "a greater Scholar than the Lt. Governor of this Province;" Such an attempt perhaps may otherwise be made at a Distance where Probus may not have it in his Power to set right this notable Mistake--The Word being thus restored, the Passage will remain just as liable to the Chatterer's Exception, notwithstanding all that Probus has said, as if it stood as it did; for the whole that was intended, was, to show, that we ought to take the Characters of Ministers of State into Consideration, before we conclude, as his Honor would have us, that every Order from them comes mediately from the Crown, or is a Signification of his Majesty's Pleasure. There is in the same Evening Post, as well as the Boston Post-Boy & Advertiser,2 & also in the Gazette of Thursday last, an Advertisement wherein the same Notice is taken of this Assault and Battery of mine upon the Scholarship of the Lieutenant Governor of this Province--I am sorry that my poor Publication, which seems after all to be of no more Significancy in their Opinion than "a Man of Straw" has given so great Uneasiness to some of his Honor's Friends--This Advertiser indirectly chargeth me with Indecency in "undertaking to answer a Governor's Message." Now I did not undertake to anwer a Governor's Message; and to speak plain, I did not think it worth while to undertake it--I believe I am not alone in the Opinion, that some messages might easily be answered, & possibly each in "one Day only": But if I had undertaken it, where in the Name of common sense would have been the Indecency of it? I know very well that it has been handed as a political Creed of late, that the Reasoning of the People without Doors is not to be regarded--But every "transient Person" has a Right publickly to animadvert upon whatever is publickly advanc'd by any Man, and I am resolv'd to exercise that Right, when I please, without asking any Man's Leave--And moreover, I am free to say, that if ever a Governor's Message should happen to be below the Attention of a Scholar, no Person can more aptly take Notice of it, that I know of, than A CHATTERER. 1The Boston Evening Post, published by T. & J. Fleet. 2The Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Post-Boy Advertiser, published by Mills and Hicks. THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF MASSACHUSETTS TO BENJAMIN FRANKLIN.1